To understand this story you must know that at one point of Ochori borderline, the German, French, and Belgian territories shoot three narrow tongues that form, roughly, the segments of a half-circle. Whether the German tongue is split in the middle by N'glili River, so that it forms a flattened broad arrow, with the central prong the river is a moot point. We, in Downing Street, claim that the lower angle of this arrow is wholly ours, and that all the flat basin of the Field of Blood (as they call it) is entitled to receive the shadow which a flapping Union Jack may cast. If Downing Street were to send that frantic code-wire to "Polonius" to Hamilton in these days he could not obey the instructions, for reasons which I will give. As a matter of fact the code has now been changed, Lieutenant Tibbetts being mainly responsible for the alteration. Hamilton, in his severest mood, wrote a letter to Bones, and it is worth reproducing. That Bones was living a dozen yards from Captain Hamilton, and that they shared a common mess-table, adds rather than distracts from the seriousness of the correspondence. The letter ran: "The Residency, "September 24th. "From Officer commanding Houssas detachment Headquarters, to Officer commanding "B" company of Houssas. "Sir,-- "I have the honour to direct your attention to that paragraph of King's regulations which directs that an officer's sole attention should be concentrated upon executing the lawful commands of his superior. "I have had occasion recently to correct a certain tendency on your part to employing War Department property and the servants of the Crown for your own special use. I need hardly point out to you that such conduct on your part is subversive to discipline and directly contrary to the spirit and letter of regulations. More especially would I urge the impropriety of utilizing government telegraph lines for the purpose of securing information regarding your gambling transactions. Matters have now reached a very serious crisis, and I feel sure that you will see the necessity for refraining from these breaches of discipline. "I have the honour to be, sir, "Your obedient servant, "P. G. Hamilton, 'Captain.'" When two white men, the only specimen of their race and class within a radius of hundreds of miles, are living together in an isolated post, they either hate or tolerate one another. The exception must always be found in two men of a similar service having similar objects to gain, and infused with a common spirit of endeavour. Fortunately neither Lieutenant Tibbetts nor his superior were long enough associated to get upon one another's nerves.